The present invention may be applied to floral sleeves and in particular to sleeves used in the retail sale of pot plants, bouquets, and the like. Aspects of the present invention may also be applied to the manufacture of other packaging, and in general to products made with non-woven fabric.
Sleeves are used in the retail sale of pot plants and bouquets. The sleeves serve to protect the leaves, blooms, and stems of a bouquet from breaking or being damaged, during shipping from the grower to a retail outlet, while on display, and while being carried home by a customer.
Sleeves have been decorated with printed images to enhance the appearance of the pot plant or bouquet. Some sleeves are opaque, made of solid, single-color material, or made with various printed images that cover some or all of an opaque substrate. Alternatively, the substrate may be at least partly transparent. In the case of pot plants, the portion of the sleeve that surrounds the pot and lower branches may be printed with images to cover these areas while the balance of the sleeve is transparent leaving the foliage and flowers exposed to promote retail sale. In the case of bouquets, the stems may be at least partially hidden by images on the sleeve while the blooms and adjacent foliage are at least partially visible through the surrounding sleeve. The printed images may be seasonal, for example, red hearts on Valentine""s Day, or red and green for the Christmas holidays, or merely decorative. The number and variety of printed images for both bouquet sleeves and pot plants sleeves is limited only by the imagination.
Sleeves especially for pot plants have also been made with separable upper portions. Typically the sleeve has a line of perforations that falls at or above the top of the pot. The retail customer may then tear off the part of the sleeve surrounding the pot plant""s foliage and leave the remainder of the sleeve to decorate the pot and perhaps hide some part of the stems. Sleeves generally of this sort have been marketed by Professional Package Company of Cleveland, Ohio, the assignee of the present invention.
Heretofore most sleeves have been manufactured of a single material. Specifically, while different manufacturers have used different materials, each sleeve has generally been formed from two layers of the same material. Although some may have suggested that sleeves might be made of laminated materials, sleeves have not heretofore been commercialized that are made with layers of different materials joined at the seams so as to appear as independent layers.
The present invention provides a multi-layer sleeve with a function and an attractive appearance heretofore unknown in the art, as well as a method for making such a sleeve. The present invention may be used to form a sleeve with front and back walls that open to reveal a central opening to receive a pot plant, floral bouquet, or other items to be packaged. At least one of the front and back walls is made with two or more non-laminated layers. The outermost layer of the multi-layer wall may be at least partially transparent or translucent, and the innermost layer may be opaque. Images on the inner and outer layers of the multi-layer wall may cooperate to provide a pleasing visual effect.
In addition or alternatively, the inner and out layers may be made of materials having different physical properties. For example, the inner layers or layers may be fluid absorbing, while the outer layers are impermeable. This arrangement may be useful where the item to be placed in the sleeve requires moisture, such as seedlings or vegetables, or requires a preservative such as a light oil or an anti-oxidant to protect against rust.
All the layers of the sleeve are made from thermoplastic materials that are fed from rolls into a machine that uses hot dies to cut through the layers and weld the sleeve edges together. The materials of the sleeve layers are selected with physical properties that allow them to be cut and sealed in a single operation. Various methods are used to allow the layers of the sleeve to be readily opened to reveal the central opening. For example, the layers on each side of the central opening may be attached to each other by an adhesive or by a mechanical interconnection. Alternatively the layers on the front and back may be contoured in a way that allows easy manual separation.
The sleeves of the present invention may be manufactured on a machine with an inlet end tension section to provide the webs at uniform tension, a synchronization section where the shaping, cutting or gluing operations may be performed along the top and bottom edges of selected layers, and a cutting and trimming section where all layers are cut and the side seams welded to form a sleeve.